Can you imagine what the keynote presentation is going to be like for the Apple Car?
It's going to be totally off the charts insane! iPhone events aren't really that exciting, because so much is leaked beforehand. An Apple Car reveal is going to be off the hook, because surely Apple will be able to keep the details around that a secret at least. The names of a few buildings isn't going to tell anybody what the actual design of the car will end up looking like, and there might not even be any Asian factories involved in the car, which lessens the chances of any leaks. They're probably more than busy enough building iPhones and whatnots.
Hell, maybe the Apple Car will be manufactured and assembled in the US for the most part? Apple has already begun assembling Mac Pros in the US, and I think that the pressure is on American companies to bring more manufacturing back to the US.
The Apple Car is still probably a long way away, but I think that it's a good thing that Apple is trying to branch out, and why shouldn't they, as long as their core business isn't negatively impacted.
Apple should just try to make a great car, in my opinion. I don't think that they should be going for a budget price point. They should be aiming to make a great car. What if Apple could totally reinvent the car, like they did with the phone? Hopefully you are holding a few shares of APPL should that day ever come.
I have no idea what an eventual Apple Car would look like, and I wouldn't even try to imagine, but I just hope that it doesn't look anything close to or even has the slightest resemblance to the revolting looking Fiat mentioned in the article.
If Apple can't make the car in US, they can kiss Titan good bye. Tesla make their cars in US mostly and just drop a nuclear bomb in automobile industry in general or EV industry specifically with their Model 3. Elon Musk probably sits in his office and laughs at Titan now. I don't see Apple can continue by themselves to build an EV after Tesla Midel 3 revealedat $35K starting price. Unless Apple want 0% margin, Titan is virtually dead!
"a resident who lives near Apple's auto testing center filed a complaint with the city about late-night "motor noises" emanating from the facility."
I am suspecting they were powering up the warp core. Until you get the the dilithium crystal assembly and the plasma conduits just right it is prone to making a lot of noise.
Probably just helping Elon out with the reverse thrust engines for Space X. One of these days they will get it right... consistently.
Well, we don't want people thinking that rocket engines can produce reverse thrust, do we? Even jet engines on airplanes can only do that by venting the exhaust forward with doors that open upon landing gear touchdown.
But Space X and Blue Origin boosters land by reducing the output of the rocket engines to produce just enough forward (upward) thrust to set the upright booster down gently, instead of accelerating it off the ground as it did at take-off.
Of course they make noise, just nowhere near the level ICEs make.
Even internal combustion engines are pretty quiet once you put a muffler on it. There is no way it would be loud enough to wake someone down the street. I'm speculating that it was monthly testing of a diesel emergency generator. That is often done at night and more consistent with something that Apple would have need for.
Can you imagine what the keynote presentation is going to be like for the Apple Car?
It's going to be totally off the charts insane! iPhone events aren't really that exciting, because so much is leaked beforehand. An Apple Car reveal is going to be off the hook, because surely Apple will be able to keep the details around that a secret at least. The names of a few buildings isn't going to tell anybody what the actual design of the car will end up looking like, and there might not even be any Asian factories involved in the car, which lessens the chances of any leaks. They're probably more than busy enough building iPhones and whatnots.
Hell, maybe the Apple Car will be manufactured and assembled in the US for the most part? Apple has already begun assembling Mac Pros in the US, and I think that the pressure is on American companies to bring more manufacturing back to the US.
The Apple Car is still probably a long way away, but I think that it's a good thing that Apple is trying to branch out, and why shouldn't they, as long as their core business isn't negatively impacted.
Apple should just try to make a great car, in my opinion. I don't think that they should be going for a budget price point. They should be aiming to make a great car. What if Apple could totally reinvent the car, like they did with the phone? Hopefully you are holding a few shares of APPL should that day ever come.
I have no idea what an eventual Apple Car would look like, and I wouldn't even try to imagine, but I just hope that it doesn't look anything close to or even has the slightest resemblance to the revolting looking Fiat mentioned in the article.
If Apple can't make the car in US, they can kiss Titan good bye. Tesla make their cars in US mostly and just drop a nuclear bomb in automobile industry in general or EV industry specifically with their Model 3. Elon Musk probably sits in his office and laughs at Titan now. I don't see Apple can continue by themselves to build an EV after Tesla Midel 3 revealedat $35K starting price. Unless Apple want 0% margin, Titan is virtually dead!
Jesus what nonsense. unless you work high within Apple, you have no idea what Apple can or can't do or has planned.
brucemc said: I understand your logic there, and those points make sense. However, what a service like that requires (which Uber and to a lesser extent Lyft already have) is massive scale. Out of the gates, Apple would be hard pressed as a new entrant to get to 50K cars/year rate. It would take along time to get to the scale to effectively compete. Uber was able to do this as they don't build any of the cars - they get those with cars to work for them.
Apple's success in all of their other product lines is to build a product that someone wants to buy - where the buyer and the user are the same and appreciate the Apple quality/ecosystem. That drive doesn't seem to be there for transportation as a service, and the ecosystem effects are much less.
Maybe they will target transport as a service, as that model is disruptive, but hard to see what Apple's differentiator is there. With the ownership model, one can see the ecosystem benefits an Apple Car could bring to an owner of an iPhone, Apple Watch, iPad, etc.
You make a great point regarding scale. It would be virtually impossible to get to the same scale as Uber overnight for a transportation service. But I don't think it's necessary to go to that scale right away. When the iPod first came out, only Mac users could use it, and that was by design.
I think the way to address that is to start regionally, learn, and then expand. I'd start in California. Build enough cars initially to provide this service to people living in the Bay Area and LA. Learn from that experience and expand to the rest of the state. Then start expanding into other state and countries that are well-suited to the product. One factor that will be key is the local policy context. California has laws and regulations that strongly favor electric vehicles. I doubt we'll see Apple cars in Russia or Texas anytime soon.
It's true that Apple has often made physical products sold to end users, but that's not always the case. Apple now has a lot of services that it sells that don't fall into that category. Transportation is just another service -- one that you access through your iPhone.
sog35 said: If electricity is 12 cents per kWh — the national average — it would cost $3.48 to go 100 miles on a Nissan Leaf. That is significant savings if you drive 15,000 miles a year.
If Gas is $2 a gallon you would save $700 a year. If Gas is $4 a gallon you would save about $2000 a year.
Plus you would not need to waste time going to the gas station each week. Plus maintenance could be cheaper - no oil changes, fan belts, air filters, spark plugs and wires, throttle body, transmition fluid, muffler, exhaust system, timing belts, water pumps, and brakes last longer.
Basically the only maintenance on an electric car for the first 100,000 miles is tires, brakes, and maybe battery. With an ICE car we are talking about DOZENS of different things that need to be changed/replaced.
Plus CO2 is about 50% less from electricity vs gas. Even less if that power is being generated by solar/wind.
I'll take your fuel consumption savings calculations at face value. That's the benefit of an electric car.
Now let's look at the cost. The Leaf is in the same class as a Honda Fit. The Leaf starts at about $30k. The Fit starts at about $15k. To make up that $15k difference in fuel cost savings, you would need to drive the car for 21 years if gas is $2 a gallon. You'd have to drive it 7.5 years if gas is $4 a gallon.
But what if the car were driven much more each year? Suppose it were driven 100,000 miles per year. Now you're recouping the upfront cost about 7 times faster.
There are very few individuals who could drive a car that much just to meet their own personal transportation needs. But a car that is used to meet the needs of multiple people could realistically drive that much.
The fact is, a significant portion of the population wants to have their own car and whether it makes financial sense factors in very little.
The fact is, that's not a fact -- it's your opinion, and I don't share it. The driving that people do in car ads is a lot of fun -- say, a beautiful day in a convertible driving along the Pacific coast in California. The driving that people do in real life generally sucks. It typically involves a lot of stop-and-go driving with a lot of traffic in stressful situations where people would rather be doing something else.
Also, except for the very rich, financial considerations absolutely matter.
But I agree with you that there is absolutely no way Apple is going to sell a car with a combustion engine -- they are going electric.
I just think that the only way for electric to work is if Apple is selling transportation as a service.
I think it's almost certainly electric, but it's *hard* for electric to make economic sense so long as gas prices stay low. I'm not sure exactly what "low" means in this context, but I suspect that even $4/gallon is still too low.
Now.... it's *hard*, but not impossible. The way for electric to make sense is to put on a *ton* of miles. The car basically needs to be running all the time in order for the fuel cost savings to cover the extra cost of the vehicle. Individually-owned cars that are only used by that individual simply don't get the miles needed.
What vehicles do get the miles needed? Maybe cabs in large cities like NYC, or cars owned by full time Uber drives.
So, I think that the go-to-market strategy has to be transportation as a service, similar to Uber. But better than Uber, because the drivers (if there are drivers) aren't murderers, and the cars are of a consistency high quality.
Another advantage of this approach is that Apple doesn't need showrooms or dealerships. You don't have to convince people to buy a new car -- you just have to convince them to use an app on their iPhone to call an Apple car instead of an Uber car. What fraction of people use Apple Maps instead of Google Maps? -- that's the share you can expect an Apple car to get relative to Uber.
It's hard to sell an electric car if indeed going from poiint A to B is your only goal, I don't think Apple is the one that will care for that low hanging fruit. Apple want to make the going from A to B experience the best possible and integrate it well with the rest of your life (their ecosystem).
That's the differentiation.
No car makers really have the capacity in that area.
The fact cars these days are built to order by sub contractors, even high end cars like Mercedes (and even Porsche almost got built that way) Most cars makers don't stamp most of their parts, and soon most won't be doing final assembly either. This kind of modern way of doing cars is the exact thing Apple is doing right now with its consumer electronics. You do the engineering and science and let other people handle the metaphorical hammer.
Apple want to make the going from A to B experience the best possible and integrate it well with the rest of your life (their ecosystem).
I don't know how enjoyable you can make a car experience when so many things are out of your control. Around Southern California the roadways are awful. Traffic, pot holes, toll booths, construction, hot smoggy air, road rage aggressive drivers, no parking and lots of wrecks, causing endless frustrating drudgery. It doesn't matter what kind of car or ecosystem you have, it is still going to be a nightmare. Face it, point A to point B is 90% of your typical driving. I only live a few miles from my office and it is still a horrible commute. Sure, a nice performance car on a smooth gently curving road for a weekend drive can be a joy, but how often do people get that opportunity?
The Medusa building and activities make me think of AR/VR/MR possibilities. Sure every publication wants its readers to think Apple is in the car business, but there are other businesses Apple can be that are being ignored.
The AR/VR/MR arena is MUCH, MUCH, MUCH larger than gaming. I think Apple is aiming for the "puck" to slide to a different position than where it currently is.
Comments
Elon Musk probably sits in his office and laughs at Titan now. I don't see Apple can continue by themselves to build an EV after Tesla Midel 3 revealedat $35K starting price. Unless Apple want 0% margin, Titan is virtually dead!
But Space X and Blue Origin boosters land by reducing the output of the rocket engines to produce just enough forward (upward) thrust to set the upright booster down gently, instead of accelerating it off the ground as it did at take-off.
I think the way to address that is to start regionally, learn, and then expand. I'd start in California. Build enough cars initially to provide this service to people living in the Bay Area and LA. Learn from that experience and expand to the rest of the state. Then start expanding into other state and countries that are well-suited to the product. One factor that will be key is the local policy context. California has laws and regulations that strongly favor electric vehicles. I doubt we'll see Apple cars in Russia or Texas anytime soon.
It's true that Apple has often made physical products sold to end users, but that's not always the case. Apple now has a lot of services that it sells that don't fall into that category. Transportation is just another service -- one that you access through your iPhone.
I'll take your fuel consumption savings calculations at face value. That's the benefit of an electric car.
Now let's look at the cost. The Leaf is in the same class as a Honda Fit. The Leaf starts at about $30k. The Fit starts at about $15k. To make up that $15k difference in fuel cost savings, you would need to drive the car for 21 years if gas is $2 a gallon. You'd have to drive it 7.5 years if gas is $4 a gallon.
But what if the car were driven much more each year? Suppose it were driven 100,000 miles per year. Now you're recouping the upfront cost about 7 times faster.
There are very few individuals who could drive a car that much just to meet their own personal transportation needs. But a car that is used to meet the needs of multiple people could realistically drive that much.
Also, except for the very rich, financial considerations absolutely matter.
But I agree with you that there is absolutely no way Apple is going to sell a car with a combustion engine -- they are going electric.
I just think that the only way for electric to work is if Apple is selling transportation as a service.
Apple want to make the going from A to B experience the best possible and integrate it well with the rest of your life (their ecosystem).
That's the differentiation.
No car makers really have the capacity in that area.
The fact cars these days are built to order by sub contractors, even high end cars like Mercedes (and even Porsche almost got built that way)
Most cars makers don't stamp most of their parts, and soon most won't be doing final assembly either.
This kind of modern way of doing cars is the exact thing Apple is doing right now with its consumer electronics.
You do the engineering and science and let other people handle the metaphorical hammer.
The AR/VR/MR arena is MUCH, MUCH, MUCH larger than gaming. I think Apple is aiming for the "puck" to slide to a different position than where it currently is.